But the memo didn’t mention anything about upcoming fights that might hike the nation’s debt limit, a topic of slight obsession among most GOP lawmakers. Not a word on immigration reform, overhauling gun laws or same-sex marriage — issues splashed across the front pages of most newspapers across America.

Boehner, whose office distributed the message to reporters and lawmakers in the middle of the Easter recess, wrote to House Republicans that he has recently read a book on Abraham Lincoln, whose view on government debt dovetails nicely with his own. Boehner quotes Lincoln saying, “[Government debt] is a system not only ruinous while it lasts, but one that must soon fail and leave us destitute.”

All Boehner said about the future is that “the next steps are critical” and he “urges” lawmakers to “engage your constituents during the spring work period, and to bring the input back to Washington so it can inform our discussion about next steps.”

“Pressure is mounting on the Democratic majority in Washington to balance the federal budget and identify meaningful entitlement reforms they’re willing to enact to address the government’s soaring debt,” Boehner wrote in the memo. “Their reluctance to fully embrace balancing the budget demonstrates they are out of step with the American people.”